Is (Un)Constructed GST a result of egosystem of our PM & FM?

GST. Government state it as Good and Simple Tax. There is a buzz in the nation about this Good and Simple Tax. After demonetization, this is the second move (or rather movement) of Modi government which has got this amount of buzz. When Modi government announced GST, it affected two kinds of people the most. One, middle class businessmen and two, middle class professionals. Till now, all the strategies of Modi government clearly suggest that they favour the big companies and the big business houses. Whichever government come into force, middle class people suffer the most. The rich class doesn’t get affected by any government because they have the power of money to buy anything (even the government) and poor class only plan for their survival. They work just to get two meals a day. They only care about their basic needs.

While middle class get affected by every decision government takes. GST as well directly affects the middle class. First, let’s see how middle class professionals are affected. GST is blessing in disguise for chartered accountants. There was hardly any value of average CAs in the country before Modi government. Businessmen used to laugh when a boy or a girl used tell them that he/she is a CA or pursuing the course. Now, they can’t do anything without a CA. Now, CAs are proud of themselves and are charging good amount of fees for any advice or help. On one side, there is rise of professionalism in one field. On other, enjoying weekends with family have become costlier because of GST.

Under GST, there is a huge amount of tax on eating out in restaurants and watching movies. For rich class, these are just petty expenses which happens every week. Same thing is with upper middle class, it hardly affects them but the middle class professionals who earn limited income are thinking ten times before planning an outing with his/her family. Government through GST, has given rise to one profession but it has also created the ways to snatch the money from them. Now let’s come on to middle class businessmen, they opposed GST and went to the biggest level against it. Government recently agreed on to some conditions of traders or businessmen of garment industry to stop the protest against GST.

Very few businessmen pay tax honestly. On an average traders or wholesalers or businessmen show only 30% of their sale in the books of accounts and pay tax according to that. GST requires filing every month and they have to show everything in their books of accounts. And that thing is not acceptable to them. Actually, they are not used to paying tax on their earnings. In their protest, they mentioned about their investment and risk but they didn’t mention about their earning and not paying tax on it. They are right in a certain way because government don’t use our tax money in our welfare. They only increase corruption in the country with that money.

I was discussing GST with one of my friends (who is a trader) and he clearly said, “Dude, we have no problem in paying the tax but will our money be used in our welfare? And will it give us the security of the money we have invested in our business? This government do not want us (small businessmen). On one hand, they imposing huge amount of taxes and on other hand, they are reducing our ways of doing the business by offering the things for free in villages. Moreover, the filing of GST is not simple at all. We will pay huge amount to CAs to get it done. What the government want us to do? Job in big companies? Their plans and strategies suggest that only. They are favouring big companies and corporate houses who has back up of huge amount of investment and subsidies.”

He has a point there. Only time (and our welfare) will tell, whether this tax is good or not but one thing is confirmed that this tax is not simple at all. Our Prime Minister and Finance Minister are so egoistic that they only care about taking decisions. They are not worried about the infrastructure or set up behind those decisions. And because of the poor infrastructure behind these steps, they are increasing the corruption. To get a single signature from Municipality office, people pay heaps of money and now, because of poor infrastructure in GST officers in tax department will start doing that. These steps are taken to reduce the corruption but unfortunately, poor infrastructure behind these steps are going to increase the corruption.

Our PM and FM are not working in ecosystem. They are working in egosystem in which the scholars who point out at the poor infrastructure behind the steps like demonetization & GST are being shifted or removed from the department.